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Essendon
Essendon Football Club, nicknamed The Bombers, is an Australian rules football club and is part of the Australian Football League. Formed in 1871 as a junior club and as a senior club in 1873, it is headquartered at the Essendon Recreation Reserve, Windy Hill in the Melbourne suburb of Essendon, but match day home games are at Etihad Stadium. Essendon has won 16 VFL/AFL premierships which, along with Carlton, is the most of any club in the AFL. Some doubt exists as to precisely when the Essendon Football Club came into being, with 1871, '72 and '73 all being suggested as possible starting dates. The Essendon football club began from a meeting held at the home of a well-known brewery family, the McCrackens, whose Ascot Vale property hosted a team of local junior players. There they formed the Senior Club at "Ailsa", Kent St, Ascot Vale. At this stage, the uniform consisted of black and red stripes.1 Robert McCracken, the owner of several city hotels, was the founder and first President of the Essendon club, and his 17-year old son, Alex, it's secretary. He would follow his father into the same post, and later become president of the newly formed VFL. Alex’s cousin, Collier, who had already played with Melbourne, was the team’s first captain. The McCracken family loomed large in the formation and running of the club.1 Equally, there seems little doubt that, whatever the exact date of its formation, the club's first official fixture took place on 7 June 1873 against Carlton, with Essendon achieving victory by the only goal. Essendon played 13 matches in its first season, winning seven, with four draws and losing only two. In 1875, before the club's first senior match, the club changed the design of its guernsey to the black with red sash that has remained the club's uniform since. At first Essendon was regarded as a junior club, and even after the formation of the VFA in 1877 the side was sometimes allowed 'odds' of, for example, twenty-five players as against twenty, when confronted by the leading teams of the time. Essendon finished their first year in the VFA playing 19 games for eight wins and a finish in fourth place. During its early years in the Association, Essendon played its home matches at Flemington Hill, but in 1881 it made a move to the East Melbourne Cricket Ground which was situated near the centre of the city and had more suitable facilities. There Essendon would stay until its return to its heartland at the Essendon Recreation Reserve some 40 years later. The move made it easier for players to travel to training but also had the adverse side effect of disenfranchising many of the club's supporters. Nevertheless, the team continued to show improvement on the field, finishing second on three occasions during the 1880s, and attracting ever larger crowds to their games. The club was part of many firsts to achieve several milestones. and in 1878, they were involved in the first match played on what would be considered by modern standards to be a full sized field at Flemington Hill. In 1879 Essendon played Melbourne in one of the earliest night matches recorded when the ball was painted white. In 1880 they also became the first metropolitan club to visit Geelong on the first "football special" train, as well as being the first side to record ten goals in a single senior match. One of its players, Charlie Pearson, was the first to bring the skill of "overhead" marking to the game and would also be named "Champion of the Colony". In 1883 Essendon travelled to Adelaide where it engaged in 4 matches, winning 3 and losing 1, Essendon was involved in the first match in 1886 where the goal umpires used white flags to signal scores, and in 1888 it was one of several VFA clubs to confront a team of a visiting rugby players from Great Britain who played rugby while in New Zealand and New South Wales, and Australian football in Victoria and South Australia. Essendon won 7.13 to 3.3 (behinds were recorded in the score at this time, but were not actually counted until 1897). They were the first team to wear white shorts in away matches in 1893.In 1891 Essendon were the leading side in the Association, comfortably securing the premiership with only 1 loss from 20 matches played. The following season saw the arrival of one of the club's greatest players, Albert Thurgood, who kicked a VFA record 56 goals for the season as Essendon again won the premiership, with only one loss for the season. In 1893 they were the "champion team" winning the premiership and going through the season undefeated, and in 1894 they made it four premierships in a row with 16 wins and a draw from 18 matches. In 1895 Albert Thurgood moved to Western Australia and this coincided with a slump in Essendon's fortunes.